“The Big Short” and “Spotlight” have been named the best screenplays of 2015 by the Writers Guild of America.

“The Big Short” won in the adapted screenplay category, while “Spotlight” won as the best original screenplay.

The Writers Guild of America West and East handed out the awards at simultaneous ceremonies in Los Angeles and New York, though quirks of timing meant that the awards were rarely handed out at the same time.

“Spotlight” came into the awards as a strong favorite in the original screenplay category, as did “The Big Short” in the adapted screenplay race. Both are among the favorites for the screenwriting Oscars, and for Best Picture.

In the television categories, the WGA gave out prizes for drama and comedy series, but also for individual episodes of series. The series awards winners were “Mad Men” in the drama category, “Veep” in comedy series and, in the new-series category, “Mr. Robot,” which beat “Better Call Saul” and “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt,” among others.

Episodic winners included episodes of “Better Call Saul” in the drama category and “Silicon Valley” in comedy.

Long-form television awards went to “Fargo” for adapted screenplay and “Saints & Strangers” for original screenplay.

In the comedy/variety categories, the winners were “Inside Amy Schumer,” “Real Time With Bill Maher” and Jimmy Kimmel’s post-Oscars special.

In the film categories, Writers Guild Awards rules restrict eligibility to screenplays written by guild members or produced under the guild’s Minimum Basic Agreement, or the agreement of several affiliated international guilds. As a result, far fewer scripts are eligible for the WGA Award than for the screenwriting Oscars: The WGA field consisted of 61 original screenplays, compared to the Academy’s 169, and 51 adapted screenplays, compared to the Academy’s 121.

Still, most of the Academy favorites, including “Spotlight” and “The Big Short,” were eligible for Writers Guild Awards and were nominated. As at the Oscars, Best Picture contenders “The Revenant” and “Mad Max: Fury Road” were eligible for WGA Awards but were not nominated.

With the Producers Guild, Screen Actors Guild and Directors Guild splitting their top film prizes among “The Big Short,” “Spotlight” and “The Revenant,” the WGA wins for the former two films meant that they’ll be the only movies to go into the Oscars with more than one major guild award.

Despite the difference in eligibility requirements, 15 of the last 20 films to win WGA screenwriting awards went on to win the screenplay Oscar, and six times in 10 years a WGA winner has also been named Best Picture.

The Los Angeles show was hosted by Patton Oswalt, who began by promising not to make jokes about “the worst Supreme Court justice in history,” and then added a few more comments about the recently deceased Antonin Scalia — who, he said, “was born in 1936 and stayed there forever.”

In a nod to the diversity controversy, Keegan-Michael Key introduced a video salute to all the African-American winners of the WGA’s film screenplay awards. The video consisted of a shot of Richard Pryor, who won for “Blazing Saddles,” followed by a card saying “The End.”

LONG FORM ADAPTED“Fargo,” Steve Blackman, Bob DeLaurentis, Noah Hawley, Ben Nedivi, Matt Wolpert, Based on the film “Fargo” *WINNER
“The Red Tent,” Elizabeth Chandler, Anne Meredith, Based on the book “The Red Tent” by Anita Diamant
“Show Me A Hero,” David Simon, William F. Zorzi, Based on the book by Lisa Belkin

SHORT FORM NEW MEDIA – ORIGINAL“Back to Reality” (“Weight”), Daryn Strauss *WINNER
“Born This Way” (“Anyone But Me”), Susan Miller

Steve Pond, awards editor at TheWrap, is also author of the L.A. Times bestseller The Big Show. He has been covering entertainment for more than two decades, and is the industry's most knowledgeable Academy Awards prognosticator.